Beach

I went to the beach and it was cool and fresh and underpopulated.

Which is good really, 'cause some days you just don't want to explain the felt penguins in your pocket.

Lecien Jelly Clip purse tutorial

I have made loads of these awesome purses lately, I have changed and adapted a few things as I went along and promised a quick tutorial for Jan and Trash (and I am catching up with them both later today) so here it is.

Using the pattern that comes with the purse, cut out your outer fabrics, inner fabrics, and I also cut out a layer of Vilene 620 ( a light iron on fleece). NOTE: those notches are to mark the darts, they are not cutting lines.

See ! Use the notches to mark the darts on both your outer and inner fabrics. (I have already ironed the Vilene to the wrong side of the outer fabric)

Look at those sexy darts !!!

This is the bag outer wrong sides out ( vilene side showing). Pin and sew around the bottom and sides of the purse. Do the same with the lining.

Once sewn, tuck the lining (wrong side out) into the purse (right side out). EASY ! Double check that the right sides are together... No really, just check.

Pin all around the top of the purse, leaving a turning gap ( as indicated on the pattern). In a genius move, the turning gap is at the top so it doesn't even need to be sewn closed later as it is hidden in the frame. Sew , and then be sure to clip the seams at the side seams.

Turn the whole thing out through the turning gap and tuck the lining into the purse.Yay ! Looking good so far !

Take the paper twine that comes in the kit and chop it in half. Things get a little inexact here but bear with me. Poke the paper twine into the frame to measure and then cut it so it is 1/4 inch shorter than the frame slot at each end.

Working on only side of the purse at a time is easiest. Find the middle of the purse and the middle of the twine and mark it. The twine is much shorter than the top of the purse, because the purse is slightly gathered.

Now we need two marks, one about 1 inch From the side seam of the purse (yellow pin) and another one about 3/4 inch in from that ( red pin). Do the same at the other end. The yellow pin shows where the end of the twine will be. The red pin shows where we will begin gathering. I use a needle and thread and run a gather stitch along the edge of the purse, gathering it until the purse fits the twine.

Try not to get too strssed about the gathering, mine are all pretty rough but once it is in the frame, you really don't notice.

Using a small zig zag stitch on my machine I sew the paper twine to the purse, trust me, this is the big secret. Ok, now go and repeat all that pinning and gathering and twine sewing for the other side of your purse. 

I

Spread a small amount of glue inside the frame. I used a kitchen skewer to make sure I had it pretty well covered. Then simply poke the purse into the frame. I used a flat headed screwdriver to really wedge it in. Leave it alone until it is perfectly dry before you attempt to glue the other sid.

I have tried two different glues so you can choose whichever you prefer.

1. Superglue : it is super quick and as strong as strong but if you spill it on the frame it is never coming off. I don't know about you but always end up glueing my fingers together or glueing things to things that shouldn't be glued with this stuff. I made a purse for market and used superglu and I used it for days, full of heavy stuff, then came home and tossed it in the washing machine and it is still holding up just fine.

2: PVA - This one is more likely to come blobbing out of the frame as you push the purse in, but it dries clear and can be removed. Again, the purses I have made were super strong with this glue as well.

In the interests of this tutorial I did try and rip the purses from their frames. No way was the superglued one moving. I was able to remove the PVA glued one, but it took a lot of effort. In conclusion either type of glue will hold your purse just fine unless you are in a bar fight.

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Biology 101

Tucked deep inside our bodies is a tiny little gland. It is not much to look at and very few people, outside medical circles even know of its existence. It is red and blobby like almost all internal stuff and most of us won't ever need to hear about it.

It controls a lot of our day-to-day stuff and it works hard and keeps us on the straight and narrow ...until it doesn't.

In hindsight I should have known things were a bit weird, but I just pushed on, as people do. I convinced myself there was nothing a few good nights sleep couldn't fix. The signs were all there, but as the symptoms mirror my general GOW (Grumpy Old Woman)  symptoms, I just ignored them.

Anyway friends, it turns out my people-er is broken. Apparently I did some serious damage to it while in Houston. I overworked the poor thing and instead of resting when I got home I launched straight in the Australian Trade Show and spent two full days peopleing like a lunatic.

I answered forty five thousand emails, promised eleventy hundred promises and talked a million talks.

My people-er is totally shredded. Doctor's have rarely seen one so trashed. It is barely able to cope with the necessary peopleing required to hold down a day job and not bite the relatives but it can not do anymore. 

I want to slap people...often. I want to rant at the stupidity of the human race. I want to go into my sewing room and never come out. I want only to commune with dogs and cats and passing lemurs. 

Yeah yeah, I know it is my own fault. I peopled too hard and too often.
 I binged and I apologise -  I swear I will people more responsibly in the future!

I am sure there are others out there with the same affliction, Doctor's say it is most prevalent at this time of the year. Look after yourselves friends. Drink some tea, have a nap, chat to the lemurs....
See you soon.

yestermorrow

That was bizarre! There really is no other way to describe quilt market. I feel like I spent longer on the various flights than I did in America ! The trip was nothing like the leisurely Spring market trip to Minneapolis.

Houston was hot, smelly and busy and we had the most spectacular tropical storm ( a downgraded hurricane) that saw half of quilt market holed up in the Hilton bar for hours. I saw nothing but the convention center, Ikea and my motel room until the day we were leaving - it really was bonkers. (oh and the Hilton bar maybe more than once -networking folks, networking)

This time, Ella Blue had a schoolhouse, where each designer had a short time to speak about their fabric range. I had never seen schoolhouse before and not only was I jet lagged, I was suffering a most explosive tummy bug at the time, so I was talking and clenching both ends at the same time ! I am sure I seemed completely erratic.

I have been home a week tomorrow morning and am back at work and feeding the cats and brushing the dog and every now and again I wonder if it really happened;  the child centre of screaming babies that was the first flight, followed by the incredibly drunken man ejected on the second flight ( along with hymn singing nervous flyer woman and vomiting woman). The crazy speed walking through LAX, the sweet gentleman from Alabama with the best accent ever who helped me schlep all my stuff to the Convention centre and all the crazy wonderful friends and conversations and drop dead hilarious moments. 

I have a bag full of American 'candy' that I am working my way through and a  whole bunch of friends I need to thank for helping me pull all this off, but right now on Wednesday night at 8:30PM - I feel like it is the early hours of the yestermorrow morning. I have dropped my phone in a drain and walked quite painfully into a random thing poking out of the school garden. From this side of the screen things are feeling pretty ragged. 

Goodnight for now blogfriends - and thanks, as always for making all this crazy happen.

Needles down

 I have been especially absent lately and I am sorry. Please don't take it personally, I have been just as absent everywhere. It has been three weeks of "no thank you "and "I'm sorry I can't make it" and "I really don't think I'll have the time". I am forever grateful that the people in my real life are so understanding because basically I have been a shut in for three solid weeks.

I have been sewing before work and after work, and even at work (lunchtime library club). I have been sewing late into the night and at every chance. Dinner guests were fed pizza from the box (no wasting time on pesky dishes). The to-do list has been consulted and rewritten and typed and re-categorised at every juncture.  

About an hour ago I turned off my sewing machine. There are still one or two things on my wish list that I would have liked to finish for quilt market but the world won't end if they aren't made. I have a load of hand sewing to finish, suitcases to pack tomorrow, a day at the real job on Monday and then off to the airport on Tuesday morning. 

This is The Cat's Pyjamas . 

I want to tell you how much I love it without sounding like a dick. I want to tell you how much I love that a little bit of my cats Jude & Eloise are in there, I want to tell you that those toothbrushes crack me up every time I look at them and how happy I am with those little cat faces - but that all sounds a bit Mrs Big-Head so I'll just say thanks for popping in, it's been a crazy few weeks so don't mind the dressing gown. I'll put the kettle on and just sew up a few turning gaps while we chat.

A post for Senior Management

Yep, truly ! I got to have another go at this fabric designing stuff. My new range will debut at quilt market in Houston at the end of October. I can't believe I will be heading off to America again. Who am I ? How did I become this traveler ? 

All of this crazy wonderful stuff has come from you guys, every single member of Senior Management, whether you are a brand new lurker or a real life long time reading friend - because you bother to pop in and read my irregular ramblings and you stop and say Hi and you encourage me and you make me laugh. 

I know I have said it before, but look what we have done folks. 

You , me and a blog , un-bloody-believable !

I am giving you the side eye blogger

Blogger is being a bit of an arse lately , but that's not the reason I haven't been posting.

I have been feeling a bit hamstered and over-doctored and generally out-of-sorts but it is all OK and I have given myself a sound talking to!

When I am not here, chatting to you guys I am usually floating about at the day job, or hopefully farting about in the sewing room. Sometimes I am teaching, sometimes I am up to my ears in secret stuffs and sometimes (though not often) I am just having a cuppa and a bit of zombie killing time.

I am (very often) on Instagram posting pictures without the blog-need to stop and chat.

There have been some birthdays which meant I made a wool version of my Circus tuffet pattern - and I LOVE IT ! But 'cause I am an awesome mum I gave it away to my TWENTY-FOUR year old daughter. (I know, how is that even possible?)

 I made a new creative card pattern : This is Karma Chameleon and he can be made in either cotton (degree of difficulty quite painful) or felt (super easy). It is the ear worm that will get you with this one !

I made him with hand dyed felt from Winterwood and seriously wanted to make a whole mountain of them

 but this little fellow needed some time as well.

This is P is for Pig , my newest friend in the Alphabet animal series. He is number seven so there are only 19 more letters to go.
Do you all get the newsletter ? It's kinda boring but it does give you shop discounts - current discount uses the code BLOGLOVE for 25% off all the stuffs until Tuesday midnight.

So stakeholders, we have 19 letters to go, having used D E F G H P T - what do you suggest ?
(and no you can't make rude words out of it yet - you know I have tried !)